On corruption

Probably a misattribution, but in lieu of reading this nonsense, just listen to Tim Minchin.

Preface: I have rewritten most of this post several times over the past couple of months since no matter how I approach revisions, this particular memorandum still seems too much like a rant.  I do not know if it is the topic or my lived experiences but apologies in advance if it still sounds like a tirade.

---

One of my past professors whom I still deeply respect once affirmed to an entire undergraduate history classroom that "corruption greases the wheels of governance."  I have hated those words only increasingly since he uttered them.  Since, in my brief stint in student and administrative governance since high school, his claim has only ever been validated by my exposure.  

As someone currently fighting on the front lines of an anti-corruption movement at UofT, I feel relatively confident promising the reader that to contend one agent's corruption is to contend all agents' corruptions.  Corrupt people tend to congregate; the permissibilities of their corruptions are co-dependent.  "An attack against one is an attack against all," except these tribes play a different game with different rules.

In my five years at UofT, I think I may have demystified the potential ceilings of corruption among both student and university administrative governments, and they go far higher than I could have imagined prior to returning to Ontario from China.  During my undergrad, vocally among my friends and classmates, I had already declared university politics "as among the worst politics, because of all stakeholders, these folks should, and usually do, know better."  Yet, my then naïveté now feels total.

---

These institutions prioritize classist, nepotistic, and ultimately dynastic considerations above all.  Moreover, the people managing these institutions generally care far more about control than about students' understandings.  Yet, many of the people responsible for preserving these not-for-profit corporations' marketed images would undoubtedly deny or at least attempt to qualify these allegations, but behind closed doors, they're usually playing kingmaker.  Obviously, not everyone elects to play that game or, at least, elects to play that game monolithically.  However, frankly, most faculty and staff will not bite the hand that feeds them, so why should we expect anything more of our elected student leaders?

There's an admittedly Orwellian thread running among the intentions of university stakeholders and administrators.  Generally, the principal benefactors of these institutions want people educated just enough—conscious just enough of what's actually going on day to day behind closed doors.  Not too much.  Just enough—to keep the institution operational.  Faculty included.  Anything beyond that threshold, and your increasing consciousness can become a growing threat, especially if you have the courage to speak and/or to act on it (by virtue of the crisis of conscience to try to do either in the first place).  

One cannot appreciate the exhaustive extent of corruption in our post-secondary institutions until one starts speaking truth to these folks in power.  With empiricism under continued assault, the stakes of any remaining good faith commitment to alethic coherence have never been higher, and I write that with a deep appreciation of the historicized moment.  Somehow, in the era in which people have had among the greatest access to knowledge, the knowledge project itself has endured its greatest proportionate vulnerabilities since the Dark Ages. Bertrand Russell would not have survived in 2022.

---

I don't know if I will ever redeem my image of the University of Toronto.  I'm not going to gaslight myself.  I know what some of Canada's "best and brightest" have done and, especially, what they haven't done with the knowledge that they had when they had it.  

It's easy to try to argue that my experience is the exception: that my exposure has been exceptionally unique or unlikely, but I have heard one too many stories from friends and colleagues to ignore the logical implications of their real experiences and feelings.

As such, it's difficult to face my students when they ask me about UofT.  I don't think I'm doing them any favours by misrepresenting my experiences, and especially the experiences of my friends and colleagues who have been harmed and could be harmed again with the same impunity, but misrepresent I do.  As implied, we at UofT are generally engaged in a great project of misrepresentation.

---

I will finish my PhD, but not with the pride that I would have had five years ago.  Universities are not immutable or indispensable; in Canada, our larger institutions' undergraduate programs continue to be integrated as public-private extensions of public high schools.

Prophetically, that same professor also once noted that "if you want to learn, just get a library card."  A small part of me regrets that I did not follow that advice.

---

To conclude, I find myself returning to Camus's alleged words almost weekly.  Despite my own bias toward the fundamentality of epistemology, I believe that rebellion is more ontic than epistemic: One exists in a state of rebellion if they are truly "rebelling".  Mere thoughts of dissent or of rebellion do not constitute or predicate ontic rebellion unless one were living under (e.g.) a totalitarian dictatorship, categorically.

If nothing else, my program has taught me that it's far easier to join (or more often to submit to) those inhabiting corruption than to fight for any other alternative.  But, the same were true throughout most of recorded human history; I can think of no exception where electing for corruption within a corrupt system presented the more difficult or higher justice, regardless of what people perceived as that which they had to lose at the time through resistance.

I told my mother something off-the-cuff over Thanksgiving that still resonates with me as I finish writing this post: "Power does not give one the right to abuse it."  Upon critical reflection of my own words as part of my endless attempts to falsify of my own positions and morality, I realized that this is still artifice, still baseless: nothing gives anyone rights.  We give each other rights, since time immemorial, regardless whether we philosophize or categorize them as inalienable and/or a priori.  Since—We can also take them away, as we have done so and will continue to do so, unless We stop them from rescinding or disrespecting what We have established as Our rights.

Only would-be tyrants fear a free and honest will.

On Responding to Fan Mail

As alluded to in my most recent blog post, I was publicly defamed during the April 2020 UTGSU Executive Elections.  The defamatory email cited "evidence" from this blog.  It's estimated that this email reached anywhere from 400 to 800 UofT graduate students after its initial publication some time on or before April 21st, 2020.  For a prospective political campaign and for peace of mind, I decided to unpack the potential inaccuracies of some of the authors' claims.  The fan mail is transcribed verbatim in the following red, bolded text.  My commentary and changes are appended in black.

From: [REDACTED for the sake of the individual]

Date: Tuesday, Apr 21, 2020 at 11:55 AM

To: [REDACTED for the sake of the individual]

Subject: GSU election: vote today to defeat racist, sexist candidates!

Hi friends!

Tbh I haven't remotely looked into student politics/elections at UofT but a friend just sent me this below. In the end it is something very important - I didn't know about the two anti-equity, anti-union candidates that currently hold positions at the university. So do please take the 5 minutes today to vote to be sure that you rank them last so they won't be re-elected to their positions at the union.

best,

[REDACTED for the sake of the individual]

P.S. Please fwd on to others as we have until 5pm for folks to vote. I imagine it is because student politics has a very low voting turn out (it is a low priority for most of us) that these candidates were able to get elected in the first place.

Hello fellow graduate students and friends, 

I hope you are all staying healthy and safe. I am reaching out about the Graduate Student Union executive elections to urge you to help elect the first truly diverse, equity-minded leadership at our Union with grassroots experience during these critical times.

Voting is now open until Tuesday 21 April at 5pm and it’s super easy!

Just click here to log in with your utorid and vote.

Please consider voting for Jacqui Spencer (External Commissioner) given her stellar record in social justice and student governance. I also believe it is vital that we elect June Li (Academics & Funding Commission Div3&4) and Lynne Alexandrova (Internal Commissioner) to promote a diverse leadership and defeat men’s rights and anti-equity candidates, Adam Hill and Jesse Velay-Vitow (see below). 

Given the appositional syntax, it's implied that I was a "men's rights and anti-equity candidate."  The first category error is easily dispelled.  I am not, nor have I ever been, a men's rights candidate.  A cursory review of this blog might implicate my critical predisposition toward toxic masculinities and the broader problems of men's violence against women; my four years of experience volunteering as a counselor in the domestic violence clinic, Changing Ways, in London, Ontario led me to fight to write and defend my Master's thesis and, more recently, to pursue my PhD.  I was literally counseling men twice my age who were on and off men's rights activism online fora before and after our group therapy sessions.

As for "anti-equity [candidacy]", at the time this defamatory email circulated, I was to be considered for impeachment due to ongoing equity concerns within the UTGSU Standing Committee that I chaired, the Policy and Operations Committee.  Notwithstanding my ongoing research and publications regarding the importance of empathy and humanization, including multiple posts in this blog, I hear and acknowledge the authors' concerns.  I am a volcel white dude from southwestern Ontario.  Equity, for me, requires a constant interrogation of my privileges and a dedication to affirmative action for others with less or different privileges; as I've argued many times in the past, the game was rigged from the start.  We need to do our part to change or at least subvert the game.

Furthermore, MLK is one of my personal heroes; his warning has comprised the last words of my Facebook profile for almost a decade, not to mention serving as the basis for my justification to continue writing this blog.  My research, and ultimately my life, is dedicated to the human project; fostering empathy and humanization has the potential to contribute toward redressing inequities.  I never put down Freire's Pedagogy of the Oppressed; I physically carried it around with me throughout most of the writing and editing of my Master's thesis and have variously argued that people should read it asap, multiple times if necessary, to understand the meaning and importance of the oppressed's liberation of their oppressors and themselves.

But anyways, let's continue reading.

Dhanela Sivaparan (Academics & Funding Div1&2) and Luwanga Musisi (University Governance) have been acclaimed, which is great news since they have strong equity and social justice credentials! It’s more important than ever for us to have a strong and equitable union leadership as we face the fall out of this pandemic on our studies and lives in the coming months. It is also especially important given that over the last year, there’s been a series of equity-related complaints and resignations at the executive and committee levels of the Union that the predominantly white cis-male leadership has proven incapable of addressing adequately.

More information on the candidates can be found here. To cast your vote, click here.

If you have the time, will you consider also reaching out to your graduate student contacts and help mobilize the vote?

Why is it vital to not elect Adam & Jesse?

Adam is currently UTGSU Internal Commissioner and Jesse is an elected member of the Policy & Operations Committee. In these and other roles, they have demonstrated their anti-union and anti-equity agendas.

So, I've already addressed the anti-equity bit; therefore, I'll problematize the "anti-union" accusation.  The authors and disseminators of this email might have been alluding to my past comments regarding the OSSTF.  As of this writing, I've been teaching high school on and off for six years overseas in China and for a private school in Toronto.  When I completed my practica for my Bachelor of Education, I met and worked with a brilliant and inspiring public school teacher who happened to currently serve as their school's OSSTF representative.  They confirmed that they despised the job since, time and again, they were forced "to defend the indefensible."  I can understand why they argued as such since I had a law teacher in high school who taught the entire course from beginning to end, including the exam, via our reading the textbook and completing fill-in-the-blank handout exercises.  She's still working there as of this writing. 

There's a threshold after which defending unprofessional, weak, and/or abusive teachers becomes dubiously moral or ethical, especially when such defenses come wrapped in a rhetoric of protecting and benefiting students & young children.  However, such is not the case for labour unions like the ETFO.  On multiple occasions, I have articulated to my colleagues and friends the importance of the ETFO since the Ontario public generally underestimates and/or misunderstands the jobs of kindergarten to grade 8 teachers.  These teachers need aggressive representation, especially during a pandemic.

Although I remain critical of the OSSTF, I love the UTGSU.  I have fought up hill to preserve the UTGSU, even since leaving office in May 2020; I have persistently argued, with close colleagues and friends who believe that the UTGSU is beyond saving, that we should still do everything we can to preserve it.  A part of the reason I still haven't sued the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Caucus leadership (who probably had a hand in writing and disseminating this email) for defamation is because I still believe that we can resolve this internally like adults.  Maybe I'm wrong.  But I'll keep fighting for the UTGSU, and I'll be there to help rebuild it once the dust settles.

Jesse is a men’s rights activist and libertarian. He has run as a candidate for the Libertarian Party of Canada [yadda yadda yadda defaming Jesse]

NOTE: I'm omitting the next couple of paragraphs since they only concern Jesse, and he doesn't deserve this.

[...]

Adam is currently facing an impeachment motion due to complaints by members and staff that he has violated the Union Equity Statement and abused his power as UTGSU Internal Commissioner. Complaints allege that the Adam has made racist, homophobic, and transphobic comments and microaggressions. They also allege that he has overtly and subtly demeaned, belittled, and undermined the contributions of equity seeking members at the Union while creating an unsafe environment for Union members to participate. Such behaviors, which I have witnessed many times, include consistently misgendering and misnaming queer, gender liminal and racialized members verbally and in print. 

As I've acknowledged in public and in writing multiple times, I misgendered a Member of the UTGSU at least once in person and once in writing.  I formally apologized to this Member and committed to redressing their concerns regarding my behaviors and those identified in the Policy and Operations Committee.  

I haven't written about my positions regarding transgenderism in this blog, but a hand full of people might remember posts that I've written on Facebook in the past.  In short, I've articulated the position that traditional gender theory, particularly Betty Friedan's gender constructivism, can contradict the alleged intuitivity and/or a priori status of gender.  It's difficult to argue that gender can be both innate and constructed, but maybe this is the case.  Regardless, these people, like any people, should be respected and validated.

It has also included interrupting, belittling, and blocking attempts by racialized and other women (trans and non-trans) to speak in Union spaces. He has also organized to block resolutions and motions pertaining to equity agendas through procedural tactics and voting alliances with other ostensibly straight, white cis-men. He is a close ally of Jesse at the Union. 

I cannot stress how strongly I believe in procedural justice as the basis for all other Justice(s).  It's the primary means in deliberative bodies to create equal and even equitable space for all voices.  As Chair of a Bourinot's Rules of Order-governed Union body, I had the responsibility to enforce procedure to the best of my ability.  In a email to all voting and non-voting members of the Policy and Operations Committee, I even offered to suspend procedure, promising to prioritize safety before procedure, something that I myself did not agree with at the time since I believed and still believe that procedure is the primary means of preserving safety.  "Points of personal privilege" are sacred for a reason.

His blog gives a good sense of his politics where he makes baffling and unsettling statements like:

“If you happen to have a phallus, have you endured blue balls deliberately more than once to the degree that you could no longer stand erect?”

This quote is referencing this blog post.  If you read it yourself, you might discern that the question is part of a bad ironic joke since it's part of a "check list" to determine whether one has achieved selflessness.  It's also a subtle reference to my status as a volcel.  I've been voluntarily celibate for quite some time; in that blog post, I discuss how selflessness requires a "denial of sexuality."  Blue balls are a real thing, and they can be pretty painful.

“I've always been fascinated by women, due to both previous sexual attraction as well as my general appreciation of humanity. For a while in high school I was even a bit of a ‘man whore.[...] In fact, I've desired to write this Facebook note for a while, I just lacked the courage and the balls. [...] Much of women's self-worth is based on what they think other people think about how they look. That's why much of society has taken to consistently reassuring women that they are aesthetically pleasing. [...] we never once touched the topic of women's relationship with the visual. I - as the only guy - had a unique sensitivity to this relationship - I think most women take it for granted. For example, my self-proclaimed radical feminist professor wore (extensive?) make-up to every class - and never once talked about it.”

The material referenced in this paragraph can be found here.  In another post that I've reverted to draft for an indefinite period, I explored that second statement: "For a while in high school I was even a bit of a ‘man whore."  I was a bit of a man whore in high school until I began to realize the full impacts of my willful negligence and lies on my partners.  When I voluntarily quit "the game" as we called it during grade 10, my wingmen legitimately contemplated killing me because of the challenge that I presented to their lifestyles and world views.  As quoted, I had wanted to write the Facebook note that preceded the blog post, back in 2012, for years.  However, my position has changed a bit since I wrote that Facebook note.  

The typically feminine has a greater affinity for the visual, the seeing and being seen, than the typically masculine.  I don't know how people could dispute this decisively.  I was referring to a gender studies and history professor who taught my third year North American Women's History course at Western University.  I don't, and never have, worn make-up, unless it was for theatrical shows in high school; (I starred in my high school musical, Tommy).  As an avid proponent of "the unexamined life is not worth living," I still wonder what we could have accomplished in that North American Women's History course had we engaged in academic discourse regarding these latent values.  Interestingly, there's arguably far more damning material that they could have cited from that almost decades-old Facebook-note-republished-as-blog-post.

“Hate-speech is rarely a thing in itself: i.e. people don't just hate on other people for the sake of doing so. They do it because some one or group's behavior or way of life threatens their own. Hatespeech then, is not what most believe it to be: an objective moral judgement, but is simply a situational perspective. Accusations of hate-speech represent one of the ultimate forms of repression, because those who would accuse others of "hate-speech" most often do so self-righteously. In reality, they're doing more harm to progress and the planet than good.”

I imagine the target audience of the defamatory email devoured this particular tidbit from this blog.  I recommend reading the 2012 Facebook note republished as blog post yourself, since it's relatively short, and it's difficult for me to argue that they're decontextualizing this paragraph without your knowledge of its content and position in a dialogue.

Okay, assuming you've read my short blog post, it's vital to understand that it was written as a response to one of my old professor's blog posts.  In some ways, both my old professor and I mischaracterized hate-speech since we neglected some of its vilest forms.  I overgeneralized in 'On Freedom of Speech', partly because I was naïve to all of the forms of hate-speech possible.  Hate-speech can describe some of the most maliciously abusive human communication.

However, the concept of hate-speech can be used repressively.  I'm sure some of the more radical among the people who assisted in writing and disseminating the defamatory email would argue that even my writing this blog post could be construed as hate-speech.

Please help me ensure that our Union leadership is committed and able to uphold the basic principles of equity and safety for our diverse membership. As CUPE 3902 prepares to enter a bargaining year and the student union continues to field off attacks from our right-wing provincial government, it is so important that there be a pro-union UTGSU leadership that fosters an equitable, open space for all to participate and build our Union.

In solidarity,

UofT Divest

To be honest, to this day, I'm not even angry.  As indicated in the graph preceding this post, my blog had another ~500 hits in the month following the dissemination of the defamatory email.  People actually read my nonsense for once.  Make no mistake, I am no less committed to all that I've said and promised in this blog.  Although, as a professional teacher and as an educator of teachers & education graduate students, I think the UTGSU's Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Caucus leadership might need a time-out.